Six murder suspects lynched by mob in Guatemala

An indigenous community in Alta Verapaz Province in Northern Guatemala have lynched six people they suspected of being involved in the murder of a local businessman.

Emergency services say local residents from the municipality of San Pedro Carcha marched five men and a woman to a corn field, where they were beaten, blindfolded and shot dead.

The villagers had tracked down a man known as The Clown, who they believed was behind the murder of local businessman Nicolas Choc on Thursday.

They beat him until he confessed and revealed the names of his five alleged accomplices, who were then also hunted down and shot dead.

Police said the locals prevented them from entering the town, but did allow emergency services to take the bodies to the morgue. Which was very decent of them really letting the emergency services in like that.

San Pedro Carcha must be an interesting region. The cops only go where the people tell them they can go. If you make a bit of a mess like killing a bunch of people, then just call up the emergency services and they will clean it up for you. Sounds like criminal heaven.

A bit of a hobby in Guatemala is this lynching. Prosecutors say that 194 people have been lynched since 2004, mainly in areas where there was little police presence.

Guatemala’s Prosecutors Office for Human Rights says the cases of lynchings have been rising year on year, with a marked increase in indigenous communities, where there is little trust in the authorities.

It all seems terribly old fashioned in rural Guatemala. The locals dispense justice in a simple easy to understand way. Rather like it used to be before weasel tongued lawyers got in on the act.